DD19 doesn’t want residential and angry husband

[Daisy123]

DD19 changed her mind. She doesn’t want residential and is hardly making it into therapy. She’s just at home doing very little, speaking with her boyfriend and on Facebook. It’s hard to watch as she does not further her treatment. She’s said that she’s spent most of her teen years in treatment. I don’t get her flip flopping so quickly. It happens quite a bit... .we are getting ready to go to therapy and then the switch goes off and she doesn’t want to go.

On top of that, my husband is so unhappy, angry so often with her. I’m trying to validate his feelings whilst doing the same with her- very draining. I just get so upset when he is mad and listening to him
Talk about DD is rough. If he were a friend, I’d have no problem listening to his rant. I don’t get why I am having difficulty doing this with him.
Ugh- exhausted!

Our objective is to better understand the struggles our child faces and to learn the skills to improve our relationship and provide a supportive environment and also improve on our own emotional responses, attitudes and effectiveness as a family leaders

[Faith Spring]

You bring up a good point that I haven't even considered yet.  How my husband deals with our daughter is so different than how I'm dealing.  He's still under the impression she's a brat.  He still thinks he can tease her or crack jokes. 

I can hardly find my way let alone shine the light for him.  Sometimes I wonder if I should move out with her, it'd be easier to manage I wonder. 

[Lollypop]

Hello Daisy

I’m glad you found us. Believe me when I say that my family wouldn’t be where it was today without this forum. We are in a much better, stable and happier place than we were 3 years ago.

So your daughter has changed her mind about therapy. I understand that must be a huge disappointment for you. I’ve been there too. But you know, from my own experience, I’ve found things started to improve when he made his own decisions for himself.

Your daughter has explained and I can’t see that forcing her will achieve anything - in fact she may resent it. My son refused to see any professional medical personnel including his own GP. He painted them black and all I could to was wait patiently on that score.

My son wasn’t diagnosed until 24. His years 17-23 were the worst because that’s when I really started to react to him. I was either too strong or too weak in my boundaries. In fact, I didn’t know the difference between a boundary and a limit. I tried to fix his problems all the time. We just whirled around reacting to each other and nobody could stop the chaos cycle we were in.

There has been no one simple key to our success and it’s been a multi targeted approach:

1. Focus on my core relationship with him (don’t sweat the small stuff)
2. Lighten up the home environment and stop judging or talking serious.
3. Learn the communication skills and demonstrate validation to all my family.
4. Patiently wait for son to make his own decisions.

Now no. 4 was the real tricky one because he would no NOTHING for years! I stopped giving him money and just provided food and board. He eventually worked out that he needed to earn money to buy cigs etc. He’s a drug taker by the way.

As I learnt over the months my husband resisted and often questioned what I was doing. I held firm (not knowing where I was going hut having faith in the process). Deep grief, anger, resentment, acceptance - these are all part of it and as individuals we have to make our own way through them. My husband was simply at a different stage than me. I demonstrated (not telling him it was a lesson) how to better interact with my son who slowly started to warm to us. My husband took time to feel more confident that my change in approach was working. Small step breakthroughs started to show and we quietly celebrated.

We all want the same thing in life; to feel loved and understood.

I wish I’d known what I know now when he was 19. You’ve got a real opportunity to be the parent she needs not perhaps the one you thought.

When my husband would rant I’d have to remove myself from his emotional place. I was teaching myself to remain calm, learning how to detach, stay out of the drama. It can be done but boy he tried my patience and sometimes I’d be feeling low and we would end up almost feeding each other all that negative energy. It’s totally exhausting!  I often thought I’d have to leave, somehow we got through it.

Dealing with the disappointment will take a little time.

Is your daughter working or maybe in education?

Hugs

LP

Ps. Sorry this is rambling!

[Daisy123]

Hello Faithspring,
I totally understand where you are coming from. During my DDs high school years were the absolute worst. I asked my husband if he’d be better off staying with his parents during the week and coming home on the weekends. My DD has horrible school anxiety and the two of them would fight every single morning. Thank goodness we got passed that. We ended up in family therapy for a few years and that really helped. I really think my husband needs addl support. He’s been really angry lately and it is difficult to manage when he goes off. He usually takes it out on me which is far better than him taking it out on DD. He has refused to go back into therapy and I can’t help but think of the irony- DD refuses just like dad. I’d like him to realize that we need to model self care. But all I have is control over what I do. Ugh... .I’m going to try validating him as much as I do her in hopes that it cools things down a bit.
My best to you, too! Is your partner willing to seek therapy?

[Daisy123]

Hello Lolipop,
Sorry so long for the response. Thank you so much for sharing your experience with me it really helps. So I’ve taken your advise and just have removed myself from the conflict - the angry husband. I’ve said, you seem really angry right now, but I think I’m going to leave the room so it doesn’t turn into a fight.

Don’t know if that is the right thing to do- but I just don’t want to walk out on him.

As for my DD- you are right, getting her to treatment can’t be forced. She must come to this on her own terms. We have set limits that I’m having a hard time living with- we said when she originally agreed to PHP that she would have her cell phone on days that she’d make it to PHP. Now what do we do? We are still holding her cell. She goes out and doesn’t have a cell. We just assumed she’d make it to PHP and fighting us on weekend PHP. Her PHP was a 7 day a week PHP.

It’s difficult waiting on her to come to this conclusion. I don’t know if my actions are prolonging her decision to get more treatment. For example, if she wants to go for a drive or walk to the conservatory, I am available. I help keep her busy by being around and available. And, I will take your advise and not give her monies or buy things for her. I’ll cover the bare necessities. The rest will be up to her.

She is not in school nor does she work. She is home long hours with friends unerring her here and there engaging in drugs and drinking even though she’s just gotten out of rehab.  

Husband and I are wondering if we should begin drug testing for the sole purpose of just keeping her from lying to us. I figured lying or not lying would be one less thing to feel shame although I don’t know for certain how she’ll react.  

We went into her room just yesterday and found the little ziplock bags and traces of some prescription drug residue on her dresser. My husband went a bit off and I said that we’d confront her about the residue and told her that we would much prefer her letting us know what she used. I figure we can atleast be honest and talk to her about it- it’s somewhat a natural consequence?... .

After asking her what she was on yesterday, DD admitted to taking Aderol, smoking weed and drinking a bottle of champagne. Both my husband are more concerned about how she is actually paying for her drugs. I hate to say it- but I wonder if she’s exchanging sex for drugs. I’ve kept that thought to myself. No need to make the husband angrier.

We did not react, but instructed her to drink lots of water to keep a hangover at bay. Well she spent a good portion of this morning throwing up. Again- I told my husband to keep his anger in check as she was suffering the consequences of drinking.

She’s bored and I am willing to go out with her- I usually am up for  a field trip. I wonder if this entertainment is keeping her from growing or feeling the pangs of boredom.

Again, Lolipop, reading your post gave me lots of food for thought. It’s so difficult sitting back and watching her just sleep in day after day after day and running out in the late evenings to get high. It’s so far from the life we dreamed of her having.

[Hyacinth Bucket]

hi Daisy,

I'm sorry you're having a rough time with your daughter and your husband. It sounds like you're handling it really well though, if that helps at all.

The spending time with her piece is a tough one. I don't know the right answer. On the one hand, keeping your relationship with her is really important. On the other hand, my therapist has told me a lot that for my daughter to want things to change, life has to be not so comfortable.

I think you should go with your gut. If hanging out with her feels like the right thing to do, then you should do it. I've found that when I was doing way too much for my daughter, I really suffered the effects physically. I'd be anxious and just feel like I was being taken advantage of. If you are enjoying your time together, that seems like a really positive thing.

Hanging on to her phone seems like the right thing too, since it was the boundary you set. She can always use friend's phones to call you if she needs to.

That probably wasn't super helpful. But I know how you feel, some of those lines are so gray it's hard to tell what the 'right' thing to do is.